During recent decades, the number of transistors on integrated circuits has dramatically increased as a result of a dramatic decrease in the size of transistors. At the same time, those same transistors have become substantially faster. As a result, computerized devices have simultaneously become increasingly smaller and more powerful. The consumer electronics marketplace is now densely populated with high powered and ultraportable computerized devices such as smart phones, personal digital assistants (PDAs), and tablet computers. Meanwhile, the expansion of the internet and the development of high speed wireless communication technologies have allowed consumers to use such mobile devices to access ever greater amounts of information and to effortlessly communicate vast amounts of information to other computerized devices.
As a result of their rapidly increasing mobility and capabilities, computerized devices are being used by consumers to accomplish a vast array of tasks. Mobile computerized consumer electronic devices of the modern world can be used to transmit information over the internet, to communicate with other such devices in a variety of manners, to browse the internet, to purchase goods and services via the internet, to listen to music, to watch movies, and to provide information on how to navigate from one point to another, to name just a few of their many capabilities.
Furthermore, many users of such computerized electronic devices find that such devices have become their constant companions. Users of these computerized devices have access to them nearly everywhere they go and almost no matter what they are doing. Many never leave home without them. As a result of the near constant companionship that mobile computerized electronic devices provide to their users, such devices have become a favorite medium for notifying users of upcoming events and reminding users to perform certain tasks. For example, smart phones are frequently used as alarm clocks that wake their users and as personal assistants who remind their users of upcoming meetings and other events.